


Stars Like You

by augustskies



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Feels, Fluff, Knitting, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Ugly Sweaters, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, andrew minyard is a softie, the boys are so in love okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-18 14:58:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18701902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/augustskies/pseuds/augustskies
Summary: Written for the prompt, “ Andrew knits Neil a sweater. “





	Stars Like You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tsauergrass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsauergrass/gifts).



> long story short, i found a prompt generator and had way too much fun with it. i’m posting this a day late since i had no time after school yesterday, and i’m definitely the worst friend ever, but @tsauergrass- happy birthday !! 
> 
> hope you enjoy this drabble as much as i did writing it (who knew i could do fluff ?) and maybe expect something in the mail sometime next week ? *winks

The first time Bee brings knitting up during one of their late night Skype calls, Andrew is silent for a full minute.

Of all the activities his different therapists have encouraged him to engage in over the years, he thinks this one might be the most absurd yet, and that's certainly no small feat.

He opens his mouth to tell her just that, but what comes out is, " _Where do you even buy yarn._ "

" Leave that to me. "

Bee's eyes crinkle with a knowing smile behind her tortoise shell framed glasses.

 

#

 

 Later on, Andrew's phone pings once to alert him to a new message as he's flicking through TV channels with no real interest.

It's a link from Bee.

As soon as he swipes the notification open, another text pops up.

_**Let me know if you need anything else, Andrew. Goodnight :)** _

The link directs him to a Youtube video titled " Knitting 101. "

He hesitates for a split second before reaching for his headphones and turning the volume up.

 

#

 

Neil walks out of the airport terminal wearing a horrible pumpkin colored PSU hoodie and grey sweatpants, because _of fucking course_.

He doesn't wave, but his face lights up with a smile as he approaches the Maserati, hands stuffed casually in pockets.

Andrew wants to get back in the car and drive, drive, drive until his heart implodes and splatters onto the dashboard.

" Hey, " Neil says, squinting in the sun.

Andrew wants to shake his fists at the sky and tell whatever higher power is out there that no one should look so distracting in such tasteless attire.

" I missed you. "

He wants to shout that no combination of words should be able to unravel something so fundamental in his chest with such familarity and ease.

He wants to tug on Neil's hoodie strings until he bends down slightly and their lips are tangled.

Instead, he flicks the idiot on the forehead and settles for an unimpressed once over.

" Your hair clashes attrociously with your shirt. "

Neil has the nerve to grin.

" Is this your way of telling me you want me to take it off ? "

" _You look like a fucking traffic sign._ "

" Does that mean I make your heart stop ? "

Andrew is going to kill him before they even get back to his apartment.

 

They should be getting in the car already, and yet his feet are strangely rooted to the spot.

With every single one of his cells burning through skin and bones and blood, Andrew grits out the question in Dutch because somehow this moment already feels far too intimate, and he doesn't trust his expression just then.

" Ja or nein. "

Also, he may or may not have picked up the language during sleepless nights when he'd awoken to an unsettling constricted feeling in his chest at the emptiness of his room, _the lack of another person's gentle breathing to center his demons._

Andrew told himself again and again he was itching for nicotine, and never, never, aching for something more.

It shouldn't have been a surprise when after a brief moment of lifted eyebrows, Neil smiles like the fucking sunrise and says, " Ja. "

But it still is.

Because even after three of years of _keys_ and _rooftops_ and _unbroken promises_ , every single answer between the two of them somehow still manages to knock the air out of Andrew's lungs.

It's the white hot intensity behind the want which leaves him disoriented and undone, or so he tells himself.

He never tells Neil that he's been living the andrenaline rush from the initial yes in a dim dorm room time after time for three years now.

When their lips collide, it's deja vu and Andrew's eidetic memory fails him just like it always does as he loses track of whatever train of thought had been occupying his mind only mere seconds before.

And if his body reacts in the exact opposite way, telling him tratoriously that he remembers, remembers the curve of those lips and the heat of skin pressed together, he ignores it altogether.

Later, he'll ask Neil just how he knows yet another language he's never mentioned before.

Kissing him feels a little too much like coming home.

 

#

 

" I'm going to go get something, " Neil announces over spaghetti.

Andrew flicks him an assessing glance as he drops his fork with an undignified clatter, pushing his chair back abruptly.

A few minutes later, a shimmery black plastic bag is dangled unceremoniously in front of his face.

" From Bee, " Neil offers, by way of explanation.

He grazes his fingers over the idiot's lightly before accepting the suspiciously soft bag.

Immediately, Andrew flashes back to his last conversation with Bee.

It's yarn.

Inside the bag, bundled into neat little spools, is what appears to be every single color in the fucking rainbow spectrum.

There's even a clear case with needles of varying size and length at the very top.

When he looks up at Neil, the other is spearing a meatball and looking back with open curiosity but otherwise silent.

He knows there won't be any questions, that he isn't going to be pushed for answers he's not quite sure he's ready to give yet.

Andrew tells himself that he hates the way Neil can read him so easily.

 

#

 

While Neil is in Boston, they watch old movies on the couch with a bowl of microwave popcorn between them and no shortage of skeptical and snarky commentary from both parties.

They make out in the shower, and Andrew kisses every one of Neil's scars.

Neil threads rough, slender fingers through his hair with a gentleness which causes his ribcage to close in on his chest painfully.

They wake up in sunlight, with tousled hair and sleep mussed softness that's too much for him sometimes.

It's on mornings like those when Andrew finds himself dangerously close to admitting a truth neither of them have spoken yet.

When Neil goes for his stupid morning runs and comes back with flushed cheeks, it's everything he can do to stifle the urge to break something.

He still runs, but he always comes back these days.

Neil takes pictures of Andrew's chocolate chip pancake monstrosity at the brunch diner to send to Kevin.

And when the man video calls, Andrew props Neil's phone directly in front of his plate so he can chew obnoxiously slowly in clear view of the camera.

Sometimes it's getting easier to wake up in the morning.

Knitting never once comes up between them.

 

#

 

Of course, Andrew knows Neil is flying back to Palmetto eventually.

When he leaves the airport with suffocating restlessness washing over him, he wants to run for the first time in his life.

The irony almost makes him want to laugh.

Running is Neil's thing, not Andrew's.

Of course, he's understood the need to be in perpetual motion to some extent before, but between fight or flight, the latter had never made sense to him in the way it did then.

All his life, Andrew has only known how to plant himself in cracks on the sidewalk and embrace darkness with glinting blades and snarling smiles.

He wants to wheel the Maserati around and step on the gas, hard, until he's back at the terminal leaving for South Carolina.

The sheer ridiculousness of the situation isn't lost on him. Andrew's life is not a fucking Hollywood rom com where the oblivious star crossed lover has an earth shattering epiphany right after conflict arises and proceeds to consequently pull a grand gesture in order to win the love of their life back.

He drives back to his apartment.

 

#

 

In the beginning, he has no clue whatsoever about the identity of his creation.

It's a Sunday afternoon when he finally pulls the plastic bag out of his closet and collapses onto the couch.

He doesn't allow himself to think too much about the color he chooses, or the certainty with which he'd snatched the spool of yarn.

He knits.

After what seens like minutes but could just as easily be hours, Andrew is surprised to find the tenseness in his shoulders which had been slowly building up over the past few days begin to dissipate.

He makes a mental note to thank Bee later, grudgingly.

 

#

 

Bee is predictably delighted.

" That's wonderful news, Andrew, " she says warmly when he calls later that night.

Were it anyone else, the words would have easily meant less than null, but maybe because it's Bee, Andrew just hums.

By the time he hangs up, she's somehow extricated a reluctant promise to send daily updates along with photographic evidence.

Over weeks which then blur into months, his projects begin to expand.

They're mostly small things - a pair of mismatched gloves, lumpy socks, useless cats which he attaches to keyrings anyways, but he always finds himself returning to the first creation he'd started.

It becomes a ritual of sorts, a routine to fall back onto whenever insomnia hits or his dreams are particularly bad.

By the time December rolls around and Bee mentions a scarf she has her eye on over one of their calls, Andrew knows what he'll be sending her in the mail this year.

 

#

 

" I swear, " he says flatly.

" If you say a single word, I'm stabbing you in your sleep tonight. "

 

Neil's eyes are visibly hovering between concern, amusement, and teasing.

When no wise ass remark is forthcoming, Andrew thinks that the idiot may just have developed a sense of self preservation after all.

Which lasts for a grand total of ten seconds.

" Still waiting for you to cash in on that promise any day now, " Neil drawls, lips quirking.

He throws the package at the mouthy bastard before he can change his mind, not bothering to control the force behind his aim.

It's purely fast reflexes alone which save the idiot from getting bludgeoned in the face.

" Okay, " Neil says slowly, peeling the brown tissue paper back, a hint of confusion coloring his tone.

Andrew can't being himself to look at him just then.

" Wait. "

Neil makes an odd choking sound.

He's holding the sweater at arm's length, taking it in with wide eyes and a slack jaw as he apparently struggles to come up with coherent words.

" Andrew, _you knitted me a sweater_ ? "

He knew he was long gone the minute he started knitting a sweater the exact color of Neil Josten's eyes.

The lopsided orange rabbit on the front only served as further proof of his descent to utter lunacy, if anything.

His instinctive reaction is to lash out with a sarcastic comment, but he fights the urge.

Because, because, because.

He's still not used to the world feeling off kilter like this. Andrew can feel himself free falling, standing in the kitchen at eight am on Christmas morning with Neil and exchanging stupid presents.

It's almost as if in that moment, the rest of the world is rushing by, and Neil is falling alongside him.

Or maybe it's the other way around. It could be the world tumbling and crashing down around them, two unmovable anchors in the chaos, but Andrew finds he can't bring himself to care.

And then all of a sudden Neil is laughing, waves of auburn hair falling into his face as he clutches the counter with one hand, doubled over and shaking with inelegant snorts of mirth.

Andrew watches him and feels something shifting in his chest, because Neil is all heartstopping radiance, and Andrew is nothing if not a moth drawn to light.

He doesn't know if he'll ever be able to say the words out loud, but he knows Neil knows anyways, and it's this knowledge which grounds him the most these days.

There are a few people in his life Andrew would either die or burn down the world for.

The truth is, though, there's only one person he's willing to live for, and maybe some day he'll tell him in words a little too raw, but for now, it's okay.

Neil is something like the fucking sun, and Andrew is sunflower through and through.

 

#

 

" They're noticing me, " Neil whispers conspiratorally, looking equal parts smug and awed.

Andrew levels him with a dull stare.

Of course he thinks they're noticing him because of the ridiculous sweater he's got on, and not because-

He briefly calculates the odds of getting away with homicide in a public place.

" Four hundred twenty six percent. "

Neil just laughs and tugs him towards the benches where they're supposed to be putting on ice skates, his Christmas present to Andrew.

 

#

 

 Andrew is surprisingly bad at ice skating.

He's never tried the sport before, never cared enough to , and now he's standing at the edge of the rink gripping the metal railings a little too tightly.

Neil is gliding towards him, irritatingly yet unsurprisingly agile on the ice as he stops a hairsbreath away from Andrew so that he's staring at long lashes dusting rosy cheekbones and winter-sky eyes.

" Junkie, " he mutters, daring said idiot to comment on the slight breathlessness in his voice as he glares at him.

Neil holds out both of his hands.

" Be a junkie with me, then, " he says easily.

" Just for today. "

Andrew eyes him derisively.

" Leaving Exy for this ? I'm sure Kevin will have the fucking time of the day when he finds out. "

Neil just huffs in exasperation.

" You're deflecting, you know. "

Then in a softer tone, he adds, " I won't let you fall. "

Andrew avoids looking directly into those annoyingly bright eyes as he loosens his death grip on the railings and allows his hands to be encased in warmth instead.

After a while, they stop nearly crashing into strangers or stumbling over their feet as Neil maneuvers them around moving figures deftly and Andrew relaxes fractionally.

Doesn't mean they let go of each other, though.

**Author's Note:**

> to E : andrew may not be ready to say the words to neil yet, but i’m gonna say it here- ily and thank you for being this incredible person in my life for the five years we’ve known each other. words cannot describe how much it means to have had you and your unwavering support, love, silliness, and everything else in between, especially over the past year. 
> 
> to everyone else who took the time to read this : thank you so much as well and feel free to leave a comment here or find me on tumblr @paphns where we can scream about these boys together


End file.
